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Chapter 5. More details about virtual
machines
5.1. Virtual machine settings
Below we describe the various settings that are available for each VM.
Most of these settings are available in the settings window after selecting a virtual machine in the
VirtualBox main window and clicking on the "Settings" button. To keep the user interface simple,
those of the following settings which are not as commonly used are not shown in that settings window. They are, however, available through VBoxManage and will be described in Section 6.1,
“VBoxManage, the VirtualBox command line interface” later.
5.1.1. General settings
In the Settings window, under "General", you can configure the most fundamental aspects of the virtual machine such as memory and essential hardware. The following settings are available:
Name
The name under which the VM is shown in the list of VMs in
the main window. Under this name, VirtualBox also saves the
VM's configuration files. By changing the name, VirtualBox renames these files as well. As a result, you can only use characters which are allowed in your host operating system's file
names.
Note that internally, VirtualBox uses unique identifiers (UUIDs)
to identify virtual machines. You can display these with VBoxManage.
OS Type
The type of the guest operating system that is (or will be) installed in the VM. This is the same setting that was specified in
the "New Virtual Machine" wizard, as described with Section 3.2, “Creating a virtual machine” above.
Memory size (RAM)
The amount of RAM that is allocated and given to the VM when
it is running. The specified amount of memory will be allocated
from the host operating system (from resident memory so it
must be available or made available as free memory on the host
when attempting to start the VM and will not be available to the
host while the VM is running). Again, this is the same setting
that was specified in the "New Virtual Machine" wizard, as described with guidelines under Section 3.2, “Creating a virtual
machine” above.
Generally, it is possible to change the memory size after installing the guest operating system (provided you do not reduce
the memory to an amount where the operating system would no
longer boot).
Note
As Microsoft Windows' activation mechanism is sensitive to some hardware changes, if
you are changing settings for a Windows guest, some of these changes may trigger a request for another activation with Microsoft.
Video memory size
Size of the memory provided by the virtual graphics card available to the guest, in MB. As with the main memory, the specified amount will be allocated from the host's resident memory.
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